Some people are just never satisfied. The entire Ball State men's golf team might be full of those people.
Ball State finished third outof 12 teams at the Renaissance Invitational in Fort Myers, Fla. on Monday with a score of 870 (+6) behind tournament winner Xavier (seven-under 857) and second-place Florida Gulf Coast (four-under 860).
It seems good enough to come away with a top three finish in any tournament, but coach Mike Fleck was firm in saying his team could have played better.
"We felt like we were off a bit this week," Fleck said. "We had a great round from T.J. Carpenter [on Monday], and Alex Stinson put up a good under-par final round. But we weren't as sharp as we would have liked to have been. Both [Eric] Steger and Tyler [Merkel] struggled, and those two guys have been our two main go-to guys so far this fall."
Carpenter, a junior promoted into the lineup this week, finished strong in the final round, shooting a 69 (-3). The lone under-70 round for Ball State in the tournament propelled Carpenter to a six-way tie for ninth place at 217. Steger was one of the players who joined him in ninth.
"I actually kind of struggled at first and got off to a rough start," Carpenter said. "As the week went on, I got more comfortable with making soft contact and working different shots around the greens. I got the speed down on the greens as the tournament continued, and I just kept hitting it better. Finally, the putts started dropping for me."
Merkel, a freshman, was tied for 15th after the first two rounds Sunday, but he slid into 32nd after a poor final-round 79 (+7) and an overall score of 224 (+8).
Ball State's two other golfers, Stinson and sophomore Tony Lazzara, finished at 219 (+3) and 222 (+6), respectively.
Steger echoed Fleck's sentiments, but he said the team could use this tournament as motivation heading into future competitions.
"We didn't play our best, but we still got third," Steger said. "T.J. had a pretty good tournament, and a couple of us had a couple good rounds here and there. But overall, we weren't on our A game, and we got third. That's nice to know that we have to room to improve, but we managed to beat all of those teams."
Ball State's next stop this fall will be the Bearcat Invitational in Hebron, Ky. The tournament will be held Oct. 11 and Oct. 12.
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